MEDIA RELEASE
Thursday, 10 December 2009
GetUp members seize on Abbott’s creative accounting
Tony Abbott’s wild claims about the cost of draft Copenhagen agreement text to the
Australian economy will be rebuffed by GetUp members today who will be contacting talk
back radio stations and their politicians to counter the claims of Mr Abbott & new Shadow
Finance Minister Barnaby Joyce.
“Apart from getting his numbers wrong, Mr Abbott’s big mistake is pretending that putting
a price on carbon represents a cost to the economy,” said GetUp National Director Simon
Sheikh.
Simon Sheikh, who is in Copenhagen monitoring the progress of negotiations, said Mr
Abbott’s made-up figures go against well-founded Treasury modeling.
“A basic assessment of Treasury modeling shows that the Australian economy will more
than double in size under either a 5% or a 25% 2020 target, increasing 2.5 times by 2050
under the weaker target, and 2.4 times under the stronger one*”, Mr Sheikh said.
“His latest spin uses carbon permit revenue incorrectly as an ‘expense’ –showing a
misunderstanding of the basis of accounting.”
“Australian household incomes will also continue to rise under the 25% emission
reduction scenario being discussed at Copenhagen and be 8-9% higher by 2020.
“This kind of economic growth will be coupled with hundreds of thousands of clean energy
jobs that will be created if we start the transition to a clean energy economy and reap the
benefits of an international deal.
“The key to this argument is Australians deciding who is more credible on Climate
Change. Tony Abbott wants to delay action, and says he wants to keep down the costs.
But the Australian Treasury has said that delay increases costs—the longer we take to
build the clean infrastructure we need to lower our emissions, the more we will end up
paying.”
In responding to the cowboy climate announcements of the leader of the Opposition and
his creative accountant Barnaby Joyce, GetUp members will be pointing out the many
inconsistencies in Tony Abbotts recent contributions to the climate change debate.
“Tony Abbott has been consistently wrong on climate change. He has suggested that
China, India and the US wouldn’t put targets on the table – and they have. He has said
that there hasn't been any appreciable warming since the late 1990s, but the World
Meteorological Organisation tells us that the period of 2000 to 2009 was the hottest period
on record” said Simon Sheikh.
“This comes down to a question of who to trust on climate change. Tony Abbott and his
creative accountant sidekick, or the Federal Treasury and the millions of Australians who
believe action on climate change is necessary and urgent.”
GetUp members will be joined in debunking Tony Abbott’s climate change myths by
campaigners from climate NGO’s across the nation.
Simon Sheikh, GetUp National Director is available for interviews from Copenhagen
on 0416 122 483 or +45 2892 6821.
Oliver MacColl, Acting National Director is available for interviews from Australia
on 0401 317 237.
*Note: Explanation of analysis of Treasury’s growth modeling:
The analysis completed to drive these figures uses figures provided by the Australian
Treasury. We have taken the GDP growth rates for the CPRS-5 and Garnaut-25 reduction
trajectories in Table 6.3 of Australia’s Low Pollution Future. Converting the decade growth
rates directly into an overall growth factor gives 2.46 by 2050 for CPRS-5 as opposed to a
growth factor of 2.39 under Garnaut-25.
The difference by 2020 on Australia’s GDP growth (i.e. the ‘cost’ to the economy of acting
under a 25% scenario vs a 5% scenario) is $14bn not $400bn. Less then 1%
This uses GDP changes as the key definition of ‘cost’ as opposed to permit revenue,
which is clearly not a ‘cost’ but rather a value transfer within the economy.
NEWS 
